From “The Long Hard Fast Years” by Nath Glasford

Life isn’t easy, and it seems like all anybody does is find solace in a thousand petty outrages. When you get more worked up about a restaurant being torn down in a hometown you’ve barely visited in eight years than you do over the half-assed job you did at what’s paying your rent…maybe it’s time to reconsider. When I was young, I didn’t understand where somebody like me could be coming from.

But now, I think it’s pretty clear that I have to go away for a while. I know it’ll disappoint a lot of people, people I care about, people I don’t want to see hurt. But I feel like it’s to the point that I’m bearing every iota of stress in my environment, soaking it up spongelike. I need to wring myself out, or I’ll drown.

Don’t read too much into my symbolism; this isn’t that kind of note. But going into that classroom every day, seeing all those high schoolers who haven’t made my mistakes…they can still make something of themselves, even if they are spoiled little shits sometimes. They don’t wake up on what should be Thursday and find out it’s their 40th birthday party and life passed them by when they weren’t looking.